Let's get right to the point. What a fun recording, this is!

It has been about three years since local harmonica player/vocalist Memo Gonzalez left the highly competitive North
Texas Blues scene and headed east, way east, to Germany in search of fame and fortune. Memo will have to tell us if he has found either of those, but in the meantime he has just released his second fine recording for the German label Stumble.

Memo's first CD with 'The Bluescasters', Let's All Get Drunk and Get Tattooed (Live) was a wonderful down, dirty and raunchy CD. Recorded live it showed the raw and fun side of a Memo Gonzalez show. This new CD in contrast, is a wonderful studio effort that shows the fine musical and songwriting skills of both Memo and his band. Sixteen songs, of which 13 are original, run the gamut from Chicago to Texas, with shuffles, jump, and ballad type blues. The mournful vocals and harp, along with the haunting guitar of Kai Strauss on the almost eight minute long song "Greyhound" are the blues at it's finest. This is a collection that, when put in the CD player to have on in the background, one finds their attention wandering from the task intended to full attention focused on the music. One can only imagine the fun this band must have performing this material live. The only drawback to this wonderful CD is the fact that Stumble records does not yet have US distribution. Discussions are currently taking place, so hopefully it will not be long before local (North Texas) fans of Memo will be able to make a trip
shorter that "10,000 Miles" to obtain a copy.

That this four piece band is made up of individuals from the countries of Germany, Turkey and 'Texas' only shows that the blues have indeed become an internationally spoken language. -- Scott Ferman

It has been about three years since local harmonica player/vocalist Memo Gonzalez left the highly competitive North
Texas Blues scene and headed east, way east, to Germany in search of fame and fortune. Memo will have to tell us if he has found either of those, but in the meantime he has just released his second fine recording for the German label Stumble.

Memo's first CD with 'The Bluescasters', Let's All Get Drunk and Get Tattooed (Live) was a wonderful down, dirty and raunchy CD. Recorded live it showed the raw and fun side of a Memo Gonzalez show. This new CD in contrast, is a wonderful studio effort that shows the fine musical and songwriting skills of both Memo and his band. Sixteen songs, of which 13 are original, run the gamut from Chicago to Texas, with shuffles, jump, and ballad type blues. The mournful vocals and harp, along with the haunting guitar of Kai Strauss on the almost eight minute long song "Greyhound" are the blues at it's finest. This is a collection that, when put in the CD player to have on in the background, one finds their attention wandering from the task intended to full attention focused on the music. One can only imagine the fun this band must have performing this material live. The only drawback to this wonderful CD is the fact that Stumble records does not yet have US distribution. Discussions are currently taking place, so hopefully it will not be long before local (North Texas) fans of Memo will be able to make a trip
shorter that "10,000 Miles" to obtain a copy.

That this four piece band is made up of individuals from the countries of Germany, Turkey and 'Texas' only shows that the blues have indeed become an internationally spoken language. -- Scott Ferman